The Middle Finger of Fate (A Trailer Park Princess Cozy Mystery Book 1)

by Kim Hunt Harris

  “See!” Viv slapped a bony knee. Stump startled awake, glared at Viv, then closed her eyes again. “Sylvia didn’t say one word about that. She was holding out on us.”

  “Lucinda and Rey broke up before she moved here,” Tony said.

  “Sylvia didn’t say Lucinda had ever dated Rey. Isn’t that kind of fishy? She just said she’d moved here from Mexico to make a new start. She said Rey lived in Oklahoma City.”

  “After she left Mexico, Lucinda lived in Oklahoma City for about a year. Before she moved here.”

  “Was he the father of her baby?”

  Tony and Craig looked at each other.

  Tony waited a beat. “That’s what Lucinda said.”

  I studied him for a second. Tony was always a hard one to read, but for all his stoicism I could still tell something wasn’t quite right. Either Tony had his doubts that Rey was actually the father of Lucinda’s baby…or he believed it, but didn’t like it.

  He had been in love with her. The realization made me feel sad in a way I didn’t even understand.

  “Lie number two. Sylvia actually said the exact words, ‘Lucinda Cruz’s baby was conceived in Mexico.’”

  I gave her a look.

  “Or something to that effect. She led us to believe Lucinda came straight from Mexico to here.”

  “What about the Polo?” Tony asked me.

  I shook my head. “It’s really nothing big, but I used the bathroom at the Laundromat and there was a new bottle of Polo in there. But Sylvia said Rey wasn’t coming in until tonight.”

  Tony and Craig looked at each other again. I was already getting a little tired of that.

  “See, I told you it was nothing. Just a hunch.”

  “But it could be something,” Viv insisted. “A good investigator could find something with a start like that. I’ll bet Columbo could solve a whole case, starting with one loose thread like that.”

  Stump snored loudly. It was a little awkward.

  Craig took a deep breath and rubbed his hands together. “Be that as it may, we will certainly look into questioning Sylvia further. And I’m sure Tony appreciates, as I do, your concern and your willingness to be of help.”

  Viv looked at me. “Can you believe it? He’s blowing us off, too.”

  “I’m not blowing you off. Please, if you find any more…information, let us know. Every little bit helps.”

  Thankfully, my cell phone rang. I looked at the readout. Les. I sent up a quick thank-you prayer for God’s timing and moved into the reception area to take it.

  “Hey, girl. Got you a car.”

  “You got me a car?” Hallelujah! Wait a minute…I had no money for a car.

  “My boy Cody just got a new job and they gave him a company truck. So he said you could use his car till you can get yours fixed.”

  “Really?” I did a little jig until I realized the door to Tony’s office was still open and they could see me. “That’s…that’s wonderful.”

  “Well, hold your appreciation till you see it. It’s not the prettiest car on the block, but it runs and it’s fairly dependable.”

  “Already it’s better than the one I have.”

  “Only problem is, I have about fifteen minutes to get it to you because my Exodus group starts in half an hour. Can you meet me somewhere?”

  “Anywhere. Name the place.”

  He told me where he was going and I named a McDonald’s not far from there. Looking like an idiot makes me crave French fries.

  I poked my head back in the door. “Viv, I’m sorry but we have to go.”

  “Tell him about the St. Whosits thing first.”

  “Oh, yeah. While we were at the police station –”

  “When were you at the police station?” Craig and Tony spoke at the same time.

  “Twenty minutes ago,” Viv said. “Pompous bunch of know-it-alls down there. It’s a wonder they get any case solved.”

  “We – uh – well, Viv accidentally got a peek at the file on Lucinda Cruz and she saw the words “St. Christopher.” I knew you always wore that necklace and thought maybe it had something…”

  I trailed off at the look on Tony’s face. I don’t think he even realized he touched his neck. The look he gave Craig then was tinged with dread.

  “Is that why they took pictures of my neck?” Tony asked.

  “We’ll talk about it later,” Craig said. He turned back to me. “You’re sure it said St. Christopher?”

  I looked at Viv. She didn’t even know who St. Christopher was, and she kept forgetting the name. Did I really want to hang Tony’s hope of acquittal on anything Viv said?

  “Eighty percent,” I said with a shrug. “Sixty-five, minimum.”

  “Absolutely positive.” Viv nodded sharply. “It also said ‘blunt force trauma,’ or somesuch. I didn’t get much chance to look because Salem got all freaked out.”

  Craig pursed his lips and evidently decided he didn’t want to hear any more about why I was freaked out. “That’s all you saw?”

  “Unfortunately.”

  “Please give me or Tony a call if you remember anything else.”

  “Sure, no problem.” I tapped my foot and raised an eyebrow at Viv. “We’d better get going. Les will be waiting.”

  Tony followed us out to the car and held the door while I deposited Stump into the front seat. “Thanks for your help.” He still looked a little preoccupied about the necklace as he held the door open for me.

  “What do you think about the St. Christopher thing?” I asked. “Do you think it could be something important?”

  He looked at the ground for a second. “I don’t know. I’ll have to talk to Craig about it.” He gave me a look that I realized was shame or embarrassment or something. “Look, Salem, you might as well know, I gave Lucinda my necklace.”

  That necklace had stayed on his neck the entire time we were married. “You were seeing her?”

  He nodded slowly.

  And why shouldn’t he? Good grief, how many men had I been with since Tony and I had “divorced”? Why should I be the least bit jealous or upset?

  I took a deep breath. “Look, Tony, I don’t really understand all this stuff about annulments and the church. I assumed, you know…” I shrugged. “We were divorced and it was over a long time ago. I signed the papers and so did you. So you don’t have anything to worry about.”

  “But I didn’t sign any papers.”

  “You didn’t?” My heart dropped.

  He shook his head. “Salem, I vowed before God that I’d be married to you until I died. That’s not something you just sign off on.”

  Of course you do, I thought impatiently. People do it all the time. “So we’re really still married?”

  He nodded.

  “In every sense of the word? Not just in the church’s eyes?”

  He nodded again.

  “But that’s insane! How could we be married for the last ten years and not see each other? I mean, you haven’t called, or come to see me, or anything. Why would you – why didn’t you – why?” I cocked my head and restrained myself from thumping him on the chest.

  “God kept telling me no.”

  “Kept?”

  He looked chagrined.

  I raked my hand through my hair. “Could you have told me about this at some point? Let me know I was a married woman still?” It might have kept me from doing some of the things I did. Maybe.”

  “I did tell you, Salem. I sent you half a dozen letters telling you I wanted to talk to you, asking you to call me. The divorce was never my idea.”

  I chewed my lip. I did remember letters coming from Tony. I had thrown them out without opening them. I had been mad at him for letting me go, for not coming in person to drag me back home. I had seen those letters as half-hearted attempts at best.

  No, the divorce had not been his idea. Six months into my pregnancy I had been driving down the highway when a guy t-boned my car. My arm and shoulder were broken, and my face didn’t lo
ok so great for about two months.

  They had told Tony and me together in my hospital room that the baby hadn’t made it, but I’d already figured it out. The look the doctor got on his face when he put the heartbeat monitor on my stomach told me all I needed to know.

  It was weird, feeling so sad about losing something you didn’t think you wanted. I had been so scared to be a mother, to be a wife, just waiting for the moment when it all blew up in my face, knowing that destruction was inevitable. I had expected to feel relief that I was off the hook. That relief was slow in coming.

  Tony, freshly turned eighteen and already fancying himself to be a mature family man, wore as always a mask of composure as the doctor told us how sorry he was. Tony had taken my hand and gripped it fiercely, had clenched his jaw and ducked his head. He nodded a few times, and then rushed from the room.

  He was the one who was relieved, I realized. He was off the hook as well. Then I remembered that he was Catholic, and maybe he wasn’t feeling as relieved as he was feeling totally ripped off. He’d been trapped into marrying me for no good reason, and then he was stuck with a loud, crass embarrassment of a wife.

  He had never said as much, of course. In fact, he never even hinted that we shouldn’t do anything but go along playing house together and pretending to be a real devoted-to-each-other couple. I got irritated, waiting for him to spring the news that he’d found a loophole in one of his catechism books that said shotgun weddings were null and void when the baby isn’t produced.

  He had refused to admit he didn’t want to be married to me, so with the inimitable charm of Salem Grimes, I pushed him away. He refused to admit I was totally wrong for him, so I became more wrong. No later than a week after I was released from the hospital and we had the service to bury the baby, I had gone out with my friends and gotten completely ripped. I couldn’t take it at our house anymore. Tony either sat on the couch looking morose, or followed me around asking me if I was okay. I was irritated with him, irritated with feeling sad for someone I hadn’t even met, and irritated with the cast on my arm.

  Looking back, I think that was a turning point for me. I’d partied before, but this had been a conscious, willful decision to drown what I was feeling. Not only did I know what I was doing – using alcohol to bury my sadness and anger – but I was all for it. I didn’t have one bit of remorse, or any thought that I should handle the situation any other way. I thought, I’m hurting and I want to feel better. Give me a drink. It worked.

  That’s the thing nobody wants to talk about with alcohol. It works. If it didn’t, no one would do it. Yes, the problems are still waiting for you when you sober up, but for a little while, everything’s better. Nothing gives you that momentary relief when you’re sober.

  Saint Tony had waited up for me that night and given me a longsuffering lecture when I stumbled in and bumped my cast on the doorjamb. I had responsibilities now. I couldn’t go around and act like I was still single. He understood that I was hurting and needed a way to deal with it, but things were different now and he couldn’t stand by and let me hurt myself even more.

  I took off my shoe and threw it at him, then went to bed.

  Yet he still hadn’t walked out on me. He refused. For the next three months I did everything I knew to do – short of sleeping with someone else – to get him to admit he wanted to leave. He wouldn’t do it. So I left.

  He had let me go. For all his talk about being committed to our marriage and his certainty we could make it work if we really tried, he didn’t put up a fight when I packed my bags. He stood in the kitchen and watched me go without a word, except to tell me, “You’ll always be my wife, Salem. You can’t walk away from that.”

  I’d grown up in a world where no one kept their word, and vows were meaningless. I’d figured if he really wanted me to be his wife, he’d stop me from going.

  But he hadn’t. Which gave me a convenient place to target my rage. Why not blame Tony? He sent me letters and I’d torn them up, waiting – hoping desperately, and hating myself for hoping – for the sight of him driving up to cart me back to our little frame. If only he would do that, I had told myself, I’d try. I really would. But in the meantime I would party and go wild and he could come drag me off a barstool or a dance floor if he really wanted to prove to me that I would always be his wife.

  I had waited a long time. After a while I had given up and found a cheap lawyer to draw up the papers. Try as I might, I couldn’t remember what had happened after that, divorce-wise. I’d moved seven or eight times since then. I’d lugged boxes of crap from place to place. I couldn’t remember the last time I had seen those papers.

  “We can’t really still be married. I mean, there’s got to be some kind of statute of limitations or something, doesn’t there?”

  Tony shrugged. “Sorry, that’s just for actual crimes, not marriages.”

  I rubbed my forehead. Jeez-o-Pete. “This is crazy.”

  “I’ve actually dealt with crazier things lately.”

  Ugh. Right. Murder charge. “I’m sorry, we can obviously deal with this later.”

  “Probably Lucinda was wearing the necklace when she was found. But…” He frowned and rubbed the back of his neck.

  “What?”

  “The police took photos of the back of my neck when they arrested me. I had this rash back there and they took pictures of it. I didn’t know why, but now I wonder if it has something to do with the necklace.”

  I wished I had given Viv more time with that folder. Now that I was safely away from the police department I had all kinds of bravery.

  “Did they tell you why they took the pictures?”

  “No, I asked, but they just wanted to know where I’d gotten the marks on the back of my neck. I told them I didn’t know.”

  “You don’t know?”

  “I didn’t then. I started to get a rash there and later I figured I must have gotten into something I was allergic to. That’s happened before. But at the time I didn’t think about that, I was just thinking about Lucinda and what had happened to her.”

  “Of course.” I mulled the information over in my mind. If the police had taken pictures of the back of Tony’s neck, obviously they thought it had some significance to the murder. “Can I look?”

  He turned and dipped down. I tugged the back of his shirt away and saw a thin red line, about three inches long, across the back of his neck. “You said this has happened before?”

  “Not to my neck, but a couple of times I’ve washed my clothes in detergent that has something I’m allergic to, and it left a rash like that all over.”

  “So did you use that detergent again?”

  “No, of course not. But I remembered what that felt like and figured that must be what caused the rash. I haven’t really given it a lot of thought.”

  “Try to remember, okay? If the police thought it was significant, then somehow they’re using it against you.”

  “Why would they use an allergic reaction against me?”

  “I don’t know, Tony, but it matters. Are there any cleaning chemicals Lucinda would have been using that you’re allergic to? Anything she might have had on her hands when she was found?”

  He shook his head. “No, it was just a certain scent, in some detergents. That scent is not in any of the cleaning solutions we use.” He wrinkled his brow, then shook his head again.

  “Well, I don’t know what it means, but it means something. We need to find out why they were interested in the back of your neck.” I remembered what he’d said about the necklace. “Do you think it had something to do with your St. Christopher? Like maybe there was some kind of DNA evidence on it?”

  “Man, Salem, I don’t know. This is all just…out of the blue.”

  “I know.” I felt like I should say something about him losing his girlfriend, but nothing appropriate sprang to mind. “Listen, Tony, I meant it about helping you in any way I can. I’m really sorry you’re going through this. I’m sorry…well, I’m
sorry for a lot of things.”

  He squeezed my arm, just like Bobby had done on Monday. What was it with guys squeezing my arm?

  On the bright side, maybe Tony and I had discovered the secret to a long marriage: see each other only every decade or so.

  Chapter Nine

  As Viv drove me to meet Les, I mulled what we’d learned and pushed to the back of my mind – or tried, at least – all the issues relating to my apparently-on-again marriage. Tony had given Lucinda his St. Christopher necklace, and the words “St. Christopher” were in Lucinda’s file. It was probably a list of things she had on her body or in her possession at the time she was found, nothing more. Tony’s first instinct had been that it was connected to the police photographing the back of his neck. Why? Why was he so quick to make that jump?

  “Okay, tell me again about what you saw on that report. The words “St. Christopher”, was it a list, or was it like in the middle of a paragraph?”

  “Middle of a paragraph.”

  “A lot of commas around it? Like, for instance they’d made a list, victim was wearing blue jeans, white blouse, silver watch, St. Christopher necklace? Like that?”

  “How should I know? I saw St. Christopher and then you began to pee in your pants because someone was coming.”

  “Someone was coming.”

  “I wish we could talk to some of her friends besides Sylvia. Maybe get a more accurate picture of what she was like.”

  I was struck by a morbidly brilliant idea. “Her funeral!”

  “Excellent!” Viv slapped her steering wheel. “I don’t know why I didn’t think of that first.”

  “Me either.” Viv averaged two funerals a week.

  “I’ll call Herm and find out when it is.”

  “What if it’s not at his place?” Herman Winslow ran the big fancy funeral home where all the Belle Court residents were embalmed.

  “Doesn’t matter, he’s got his finger on the pulse of all the deceased in Estacado County.”

  “So to speak.”

  “So to speak, exactly.”

  She fished in her big bucket bag as she rounded the corner at Avenue Q and 34th, swerving into the turn lane and getting us three angry honks in the process. I reached over and swiped the phone out of her hand.